Official introduction of derekmac

[derekmac]

Hello all,

I've been watching and posting since November or so, but I thought I would introduce myself. My friend and I started brewing last summer/fall using a homebrew kit from NG and a Festabrew (West Coast IPA) which turned out to be lip-smackin' good! We did a stout, and then another West Coast IPA, and then a couple cans of Coopers and BrewMaster or something, and then a couple of all grain (first with dextrose, and then with just grain and malt). Our last 2, among my top favorites, were NG's 1820IPA. The first was short on hops, but tasted wonderful (best beer I had in my life, seriously). The last was by the recipe, and had that signature hops flavour of IPA. Still very good, and very much like the West Coast IPA by Festa.

I have learned a few things in my time as a homebrewer (not including those few batches in high school 25 years ago):

1. I prefer liquid yeast over dry yeast. They have all carbonated well, but the dry yeast always seems to give a taste that I can only characterize as "canned homebrew" (although the can has nothing to do with the dry yeast - perhaps I really mean "cheap/lazy homebrew")
2. I prefer all-grain as opposed to added malt extract and liquid sugar.
3. This hobby can be expensive. My initial strategy was to collect everything I need by buying big batches of stuff, keeping what I need, and selling (trying to) off the rest. My strategy now is to only spend money on heat and ingredients.
4. Start basic. My "basic" strategy now, after doing a couple successful allgrain brews, is to start brewing with just malted barley, hops, yeast and water (who said Reinheitsgebot?). I believe this is the centre/core/chi/tao of brewing.

My next step is to participate in the next group order (British Pale Malt and some type of hops) and brew some batches from there, perhaps experimenting with different yeasts.

Lastly, my best advice, in simplest terms, is just...

...enjoy your brew.

Happy Beer!

[mr x]

Good write-up. I'm just a stupid letter...